


Flash visits Arrow in Prison

by Ncredible



Series: Visiting Oliver in Prison [1]
Category: Arrow (TV 2012), The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Heroes chatting, Oliver in prison, Oliver makes a pop culture reference, barry freaking out about fatherhood, post season 4 flash, post season 6 arrow, sizzle trailer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-11
Updated: 2018-08-30
Packaged: 2019-06-08 14:20:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,480
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15245244
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ncredible/pseuds/Ncredible
Summary: Barry is freaking out about now being a parent of an adult Nora West-Allen and goes to visit Oliver in prison for some advice.





	1. Chapter 1

“Lights out!” calls out the prison guard as the lights dim throughout the prison block. I lay down on the mattress provided and I absently can’t help but think that this is mattress is more comfortable than most of the places I slept in while I on Lian Yu and Russia. If it weren’t for Felicity and William on the outside, then this wouldn’t be the worst thing I have ever been through. 

I pull the sheet up and close my eyes and try and get some sleep and remember that visitation is tomorrow. Felicity is bringing William and for an hour tomorrow we can pretend that everything is normal. And I can hear all about William latest science project, and have Felicity try to explain it to me the next day before we go back to arguing about the fact that I didn’t tell her what my deal with Agent Watson was before I took it. 

Just as I close my eyes, I hear a familiar whooshing that is only ever associated with a Speedster. As I sit up on the mattress, a flash of red phases into my cell.

“What are you doing?” I demand from the Flash who is now inside my cell in front of me. 

“I needed to talk to you,” Barry says with his voice disguised like he usually does when talking to people in Central City. I think Felicity says he vibrates his vocal cords. 

“You know there are visiting hours,” I tell him seriously. 

“I didn’t want to interrupt your time with William or Felicity,” he tells me. 

Touched by his consideration, “I appreciate that, Flash, but what was so important that you broke into a Maximum-security prison?”

“You call this Maximum, try the meta-human cells in Iron Heights, those are Maximum security.”

“Did you come to debate which prisons were more secure or did you need something, Flash?” 

“Right. Cisco looped the feed for your cell for the next twenty minutes, so I could come talk to you. I need your help Oliver,” Barry says taking off his mask. 

“In case you hadn’t noticed I’m currently unavailable, but I will be more than happy to help next decade when my parole comes up.”

“Did you just make a joke?” Barry comments.

“What do you need, Barry.” Trying to get to the point if we have a deadline. 

“Iris and I have a daughter.” 

“Congratulations Barry, I had no idea you and Iris were trying to have a baby. That’s great, I know it was probably for the best Samantha kept William a secret, but a baby would have been such a gift…” 

Barry interrupts me, “No. We’re not… Iris isn’t pregnant.”

“Are you adopting?” Not sure what Barry is getting at. 

“No.”

“You just said you two had a daughter, I think we’ve gone through the options for getting a child.”

“She’s from the future. My daughter. I will have a daughter. We haven’t yet. But we will sometime soon. She’s 24, Ollie.” I feel the familiar migraine that usually accompanies one of Barry’s science fiction problems forming behind my eyes.

“I’m not sure what you want me to do, Barry.” 

“How did you do it, man?” 

“Do what?” 

“How did you become a great father to kid you weren’t always there for or haven’t always been there for?” 

I look around the cell before speaking, “I don’t know how much of a good father I have been, we are standing in a prison having this conversation, Barry.”

“You know what I mean, William loves you. He really took to you and Felicity says he’s worried for you in here. How did you do that? After what happened to Samantha, Iris said he had trust issues when he first got to Star City.”

“I showed up and kept showing up. I kept trying, I let William know I will always be there for him even if he didn’t want me there.”

“How do I do this, Oliver?” 

“Try talking to… I didn’t get her name.”

“Nora, her name is Nora.”

“It’s beautiful, Barry. Whenever she is born. I’m sure your mom would be honored.” I tell him seriously. 

“Talk to her? I mean she is our age and we don’t know anything about her, but she knows everything about us. She knows how we take our coffee and she knows where we live and knows where Iris keeps her car keys. She asks us if she can use the car. That was a bad idea, she nearly ran it off the road. She isn’t a very good driver. She just has all of these memories of things that haven’t happened yet for Iris and me. How do I just talk to her? How do you parent someone who doesn’t need a parent.”

“Try just getting to know her. The rest will fall into place.” I tell him hoping my experience with William will help Barry with this new daughter of his. There is another swooshing coming, “is there another…”

Before I finish my sentence, another speedster is in my cell, but this one has purple streaks instead of Barry’s red or Reverse Flash’s yellow. Speedsters give me a headache. 

“Dad, Cisco says you have three minutes left,” the new speedster says, she must be Nora. 

“Why didn’t he use the comms?” Barry asks.

“This was quicker,” Nora shrugs and focuses on me, “Uncle Ollie!” 

“Uncle?” I ask feeling the migraine getting stronger. 

“Yea, Dad always talks about how much he learned from you when he was starting out, but he never let me train with you. Said it was too dangerous,” Nora says. Barry begins to mutter something about arrows in his back before Nora speaks over him, “but I was hoping I could train the Great Green Arrow himself while I am in this time period, Please?” I will say that the endless optimism Barry has is something he passed on to his daughter. 

“I’m a bit tied up at the moment,” I start.

“Yea, but you won’t be here long, I mean…”

“Maybe no future knowledge would be a good thing,” Barry cuts in. 

Nora looks dutifully reprimanded before asking, “but when you’re out? Can we train together, please Uncle Ollie? It’ll be fun.” 

At a loss for words, “we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it. You two should go before the camera feeds go live again.” Just like that Nora Allen is gone, but Barry is still her and I tell him, “just talk to her. I’m sure she is just as confused by this situation as you are.”

“Talk, yea I can do that,” Barry says psyching himself up as he pulls his mask back up.

“Good luck, Barry, and you can visit during normal visiting hours.” I say holding my hand out to shake his, but as usually he goes in for a hug that I return. As I pat his back there is swoosh and just like that the Flash is gone. That really is annoying I think to myself as I climb back onto the mattress again. Barry has a daughter. From the future. I rub my temples willing the Barry sized migraine to go away as I think about ‘Uncle Ollie’. That’s odd too. I pull the sheet up again and decide if Nora is still here when I get out that if Nora wants to train, and Iris and Barry are okay with it, I’ll give it a go against another speedster. I close my eyes thinking about how to best a speedster who has knowledge about everything I have done until this point in my life. Though she hasn’t master oversharing yet, she is definitely Barry Allen’s daughter.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter came from the scene in the sizzle trailer where Barry asks Nora what happens or something and I thought she was looking at a picture of Barry and Iris. This is my take on potentially why Nora never had a scene with Iris before the finale. 
> 
> I wrote most of this before I saw the episode titles for next season.

There that familiar zooming noise that only comes with a speedster in the area or the prison unit. I lift my head from my mattress just as Barry phases through the bars of my cell. 

Sitting up, “I thought we about this? You can visit during normal hours.”

“We did, but this couldn’t wait, and it couldn’t be discussed in visiting hours.” Barry says using his vibrating technique to mask his voice. Barry puts his hand up to his ear clearly listening to someone in his comms. He nods his head once and looks at me and using his normal voice says, “Cisco was able to give us as much time as we need this time.”

I stand and cross my arms, “okay, what couldn’t wait?” 

“Before Nora told us who she was… she kind of stalked us. A little. Or ‘randomly’ ran into us. She was one of the servers at the wedding before the Nazi’s showed up. She ran into Cisco, Caitlyn, Harry, Joe and she even interacted with Ralph.”

“Okay, so she wanted to get a feel for what was going on now. What’s so weird about that? Sounds like she was observing her surroundings. Maybe she does a better job with that than her Father does.” 

“Ha ha,” Barry deadpans, “but she avoided meeting Iris. And now she is still avoiding her more than the rest of us. She makes excuses to go somewhere else every time Iris walks into the room.” 

“Maybe Iris is just the disciplinarian between the two of you and she knows that Iris isn’t likely to be happy that she traveled back in time.” I say, but I’m not sure I believe that and that headache that comes with speedster’s problems.

“Except I asked her what was going on.” Barry admits.

“Why would you do that? You told me how dangerous it was for anyone to mess with time. It pushes back. Isn’t that what you said.” I tell him. 

“She didn’t tell me,” Barry says, “but her poker face isn’t that good. I know something happens.”

“Barry, I don’t pretend to understand time travel or the rules of superspeed, but whatever happened it’s for the best that she didn’t tell you anything.”

“How can it be for the best? If something happens to her.” 

“Well, too much knowledge and she could end up being like Marty McFly in Back to the Future.” 

“You saw Back to the Future?”

I chuckle, “yes, Barry, I can watch movies too, Thea and I used to have movie nights before I got on the Gambit.” 

“But, she’s acting like Iris is a stranger. And if I don’t do anything I can’t save her or their relationship. If Nora won’t tell me, I can’t fix it.”

Hesitantly I say, “Or you could make it worse. You spent the better part of a year trying to save Iris from Savitar after, Flashpoint, was it.”

“And I saved her, and I fixed what I could from Flashpoint,” Barry defends.

“But at what cost?” 

“If you’re talking about HR….” Barry starts angrily.

“It wasn’t,” I say quickly holding my hands up to keep Barry quiet, “I meant, from what Felicity said, it sounded like you missed the moments in your life. Felicity told me that the first time you proposed it was because you were trying to change the future. I’m not saying it wasn’t real, I’m just saying that you were missing what was going on in the present.”

“But if something happens to Iris how am I going to live with that?”

“Something could happen to Iris,” I concede, “or maybe Nora and her mother just have a difficult relationship. Or there are any number of other explanations it could be. I don’t know what it could be and neither do you and maybe you shouldn’t try to find out. Because I have to believe that whatever is going on was meant to happen; and that means not trying to fix a future you don’t know the whole story about.” 

“What if something does happen to Iris?” 

“It will be devastating, of that I have no doubt, but if you obsess about something that hasn’t happened yet, you’ll miss everything going on now. You are getting this amazing chance to meet your daughter all grown up, just enjoy that while you can and try not to let any thoughts of what if get in the way.” I tell him, “but I understand that is much easier said than done.”

“I just can’t get the bad out of my head,” Barry admits.

“I know it can’t be easy, but focus on the good, you aren’t a god, Barry, you can’t always stop what is coming.” 

There is flash of purple and Nora West-Allen is standing in front of me. These damn speedsters are going to give me another headache. 

“Dad, we need you back at Star Labs. Iris has another theory about what is keeping me here,” Nora says.

“Okay, Oliver thanks for listening,” Barry says extending his hand instead of trying to hug me for once. 

I shake his hand, “anytime. Next time, visiting hours. Okay?”

“Visiting hours,” Barry promises.

“Remember, just concentrate on the now,” Barry nods his head and with that he is gone.

“Uncle Ollie,” Nora beams and the air around her begins showing the purple streaks around her signaling her leave.

“Nora,” I call out and the purple streaks stop, “look I don’t know what is going on or why you are here, but you need to work on your poker face.”

“What do you mean?” Nora tries to innocently evade. 

“You know what I mean. You’re calling Barry, Dad…” I begin.

“Well, he is my dad.” Nora defends.

“And you call Iris by her name. I can’t imagine you haven’t learned the dangers of time travel with Barry as you father. You need to do better…”

“Or I could Marty McFly, myself out of the future, I know, Uncle Ollie.”

“Then why did you come here? It can’t have just been a joy ride to the past. I can’t believe a speedster child of Barry Allen wouldn’t have learned the dangers of time travel.”

“I did. I promise. When my speed showed up in was years before Dad let me do anything by myself. I didn’t come here on a whim.” 

“But now you can’t get home.”

“No, I couldn’t stand by and not help Dad with the Thinker.”

“I hope you know what you are doing.” I tell her sincerely.

“Uncle Ollie?”

“Yea?”

“You know Will…”

“No, I don’t want to know anything about the future. I don’t want to change my future. I learned from Back to the Future.”

Nora chuckles, “and Dad always says you don’t have much of a sense of humor. It’s just you don’t share Dad and Aunt Felicity’s brand of humor.”

“Or yours, I imagine. You should go, you don’t want keep them waiting,” 

“Thanks, Uncle Ollie.” With that there is a purple streak and I feel a phantom hug and I think Nora hugged me before leaving. She really is a lot like Barry.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading. Kudos and Comments make my day.


End file.
